[Ext]Session Manager 0.8.1.13 - January 30, 2017

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GLint
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Joined: December 4th, 2013, 12:44 pm

Re: [Ext]Session Manager 0.8.1.13 - January 30, 2017

Post by GLint »

Brummelchen wrote:no, they are complete different - while SM is legacy and has its own folder \sessions is TSM (webextension) storing here \browser-extension-data\Tab-Session-Manager@sienori

currently i never lost any session with firefox 57 - even with 100 tabs open. its session management has improved so much.
TSM is very equal to SM as i wrote above.
I can't see a thread specifically for 'Tab Session Manager' so I'm asking here:

You have used 'TSM' and I've tried but can't get the tabs to load when I open firefox (I only ever use 1 window), like it usually does with 'Session Manager'.
I'm not too sure what the options mean and what I should be using so that it works as 'SM' used to.
With 'TSM' I can see that it has saved my session and my tabs but it does not load the tabs when I start Firefox and opens another window?
I've just unchecked 'Open session in new window' so that should solve the problem with another window opening, but still no tabs are being loaded?
I have 'Save session regularly' set to 10 (default). Does this mean that once those 10 are used it will start wiping over the previous ones?
Your help would be much appreciated.
Elhem Enohpi
Posts: 49
Joined: March 19th, 2016, 8:49 am

Re: [Ext]Session Manager 0.8.1.13 - January 30, 2017

Post by Elhem Enohpi »

Brummelchen wrote:for those who care - "Tab Session Manager" seems a very decent replacement for Session Manager.[...]
i currently see no effort to put SM on new rails because the API dont exists - rubbish from my view - as proved its possible[...] TSM is very equal to SM as i wrote above.
There are several significant limitations to TSM, compared with SM:
  • - Doesn't save tab history. There is no Web Extension API for that, Web Extensions are not allowed to access tab history. See bug 1378651. This is very important, to know how I got to the page. I want my tabs restored as they were, the way the built-in "show my tabs from last time" session restore works. If you lose all tab history when restarting/restoring sessions, that is for me completely unacceptable.

    - Doesn't support Window Sessions. I only ever use Window Sessions, so that I can close and re-open any window at any time, in any combination. It's like saving a word-processing document, it's the most basic thing, to save and re-open a window. I really don't understand why browsers don't work this way by default, nor how anyone can use a browser without this feature!

    - Many other missing features, for loading, searching, and organizing windows and sessions.
This isn't a criticism of Tab Session Manager, because it faces the same problems of missing APIs, and also it's very new, where Session Manager has been in development for many years. It's a good first effort, but Tab Session Manager is in no way equal to Session Manager, and without the necessary APIs, never will be.
avada
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Joined: February 10th, 2008, 6:30 am
Location: Hungary

Re: [Ext]Session Manager 0.8.1.13 - January 30, 2017

Post by avada »

DN123ABC wrote:Good idea on the 56.0.1 final.

The 57 WAS a lot faster, though, until it broke completely. If I could have frozen it in time before "Session Manager" broke, I would; until such time that my extensions are all brought up to modern versions.
Not really. When 57 hits stable the same thing will happen.
DN123ABC wrote:The 57 WAS a lot faster, though, until it broke completely. If I could have frozen it in time before "Session Manager" broke, I would; until such time that my extensions are all brought up to modern versions.
I think you have some illusions. 57 was a "lot" faster because all your classic extensions were disabled.
Also there's no such thing as having legacy extensions on ff57 and breaking after some time. 57 just doesn't load them at all.
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GHM113
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Location: Moscow, Russia

Re: [Ext]Session Manager 0.8.1.13 - January 30, 2017

Post by GHM113 »

Elhem Enohpi wrote:Tab Session Manager is in no way equal to Session Manager, and without the necessary APIs, never will be.
Yep, Tab Session Manager is basically glorified bookmark manager.
Sorry for my poor English.
Elhem Enohpi
Posts: 49
Joined: March 19th, 2016, 8:49 am

Re: [Ext]Session Manager 0.8.1.13 - January 30, 2017

Post by Elhem Enohpi »

An update for those wondering if/when a Web Extensions version of Session Manager could be possible:

There are some things that Session Manager does that are still not possible to do with Web Extensions until Mozilla provides the interface (API) to do so. These impact all tab/session restoring extensions, not just Session Manager. Also I can't speak for Morac, even if the APIs are implemented, he may or may not port Session Manager to Web Extensions. I suppose it would be a lot of work.

1. Access, modify, and restore back-forward tab history. This is necessary to be able to restore tabs' histories when restoring a session, in the same way the built-in "show my tabs from last time" does. Otherwise all tab history is lost when restoring a session. That makes it more similar to just opening a set of bookmarks than truly restoring tabs. This is probably the main issue that's blocking Session Manager from working in Firefox 57 the way it does in earlier versions.
- Status: The function/API has been requested, but has not been approved by Mozilla, and nobody is working on it. It was approved for Google Chrome many years ago, and someone was working on it, but it looks like they abandoned it a couple of years ago, and there's no further progress. It seems unlikely to be finished anytime soon.
- https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1378651
- https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1381922
- http://groups.google.com/a/chromium.org ... be7420f4db#
- https://groups.google.com/forum/?fromgr ... 6zY2ZjGSYg

2. Restore sessions without loading all the tabs. Only load the selected tab, and create the others in an unloaded (a.k.a. "discarded") state, until they are clicked on. Important when loading a session with hundreds of tabs!
- Status: The function has been approved by Mozilla for Web Extensions, but at the moment nobody is working on implementing it. However it seems possible to be finished soon, as related work is being done.
- https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1378647
It seems that it would depend on allowing Web Extensions to unload/discard tabs, which is currently being worked on (at least for desktop browsers) and nearly complete, here:
- https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1322485

There may be other issues I don't know about, but these seem to be the main ones that remain. If you want to express your support for Mozilla to implement the necessary functions in Firefox, you can get a Bugzilla account and vote for the above bugs, particularly 1378651. Please follow Bugzilla etiquette, and just vote for the bug without commenting. Comments like "you need to fix this!" aren't helpful.
Brummelchen
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Re: [Ext]Session Manager 0.8.1.13 - January 30, 2017

Post by Brummelchen »

@Elhem - i know the differences and you also pointed out why users have to wait veeeryyyyy looooong until the desired API is built in. you can hold the hope until june'18 but what if not? even then such snarky comments from GHM wont help out in any way. the only option now and then is to abandon firefox and change to PM or WF. as i mentioned earlier i try to help out if possible. but mozilla is also receptive for code changes of encouraged members.
Elhem Enohpi
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Joined: March 19th, 2016, 8:49 am

Re: [Ext]Session Manager 0.8.1.13 - January 30, 2017

Post by Elhem Enohpi »

Another update: after I posted some additional information in the bugzilla bug yesterday, the API to allow Web Extensions read-only access to forward-backward tab history (bug 1378651) has been marked as approved by Mozilla. Of course now we have to wait for someone to take the job of actually implementing it! But it's progress. Unfortunately it looks like the ability to actually modify/restore a tab's history (bug 1381922) has not yet been approved, and requires more discussion. I don't know when that will happen.

It looks like eventually there will be the possibility to port Session Manager to Web Extensions, or for some other extension with similar capabilities including restoring history. I'm guessing it's likely that it could happen sometime in the next few months if someone takes it on, but it definitely won't be ready when Firefox 57 comes out in less than three weeks from now. In other words, there won't be any tab/session manager, besides the built-in "show my tabs from last time", capable of restoring tab history starting November 14, probably for at least several months.

Once FF 57 comes out, support for security patches to FF 56 stops, and it would be risky to keep using it for long. It's possible to switch back to FF 52 ESR until June, but then you lose some of the multiprocess e10s features and other recent improvements - and there's no guarantee a user profile from FF 56 will work flawlessly on FF 52. My plan is to switch to Waterfox while waiting for Web Extension versions of my most needed addons, including Session Manager. Waterfox based on FF 56 with security updates and some other small changes should be available before November 14, and should be supported long-term. Pale Moon is so different from Firefox that for me it's not a good option.
fracama87
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Joined: November 1st, 2017, 6:12 am

Re: [Ext]Session Manager 0.8.1.13 - January 30, 2017

Post by fracama87 »

Elhem Enohpi wrote:Another update: after I posted some additional information in the bugzilla bug yesterday, the API to allow Web Extensions read-only access to forward-backward tab history (bug 1378651) has been marked as approved by Mozilla. Of course now we have to wait for someone to take the job of actually implementing it! But it's progress. Unfortunately it looks like the ability to actually modify/restore a tab's history (bug 1381922) has not yet been approved, and requires more discussion. I don't know when that will happen.

It looks like eventually there will be the possibility to port Session Manager to Web Extensions, or for some other extension with similar capabilities including restoring history. I'm guessing it's likely that it could happen sometime in the next few months if someone takes it on, but it definitely won't be ready when Firefox 57 comes out in less than three weeks from now. In other words, there won't be any tab/session manager, besides the built-in "show my tabs from last time", capable of restoring tab history starting November 14, probably for at least several months.

Once FF 57 comes out, support for security patches to FF 56 stops, and it would be risky to keep using it for long. It's possible to switch back to FF 52 ESR until June, but then you lose some of the multiprocess e10s features and other recent improvements - and there's no guarantee a user profile from FF 56 will work flawlessly on FF 52. My plan is to switch to Waterfox while waiting for Web Extension versions of my most needed addons, including Session Manager. Waterfox based on FF 56 with security updates and some other small changes should be available before November 14, and should be supported long-term. Pale Moon is so different from Firefox that for me it's not a good option.
Bug 1322485 - Implement tabs.discard method for Desktop
is marked as solved and will be implemented in FF 58. WE have some hopes.
RobAGD
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Joined: November 7th, 2017, 6:38 am

Re: [Ext]Session Manager 0.8.1.13 - January 30, 2017

Post by RobAGD »

I really hope a updated version gets made, I wanted to test something else and completely forgot that SM wasn't compatible with the new FF Doh :(

Is the session manager file able to be open to pull url's out?

Thanks

-R
Elhem Enohpi
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Joined: March 19th, 2016, 8:49 am

Re: [Ext]Session Manager 0.8.1.13 - January 30, 2017

Post by Elhem Enohpi »

I think it will be many months - if ever - before Session Manager or an equivalent replacement that can fully restore sessions including history, can be made. Mozilla hasn't even agreed to permit web extensions to restore tab histories, nevermind written the API code to enable them to do it. It's still too early to say what will happen.

The Session Manager files are readable text, but they're quite complicated and only meant to be read by the computer. If you only want URLs of the current pages, you can just open the sessions in the last working version of Firefox, and bookmark all the tabs in folders. Then you can import the bookmarks into Firefox Quantum. If you use Tree Style Tab, there's also a function to export tree structures and import them into the new version. But neither of these will bring the tabs' history.
radar52
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Joined: November 9th, 2017, 4:25 pm

Re: [Ext]Session Manager 0.8.1.13 - January 30, 2017

Post by radar52 »

Hi, I just upgraded my FF to v56.0 and now the Session Manager icon does NOT show in my toolbar. I've checked in Add-ons, and SM is active and there is no SM icon in the toolbar "Customize" tab. Can someone please tell me how to fix this?
Thanks
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Protocol
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Re: [Ext]Session Manager 0.8.1.13 - January 30, 2017

Post by Protocol »

Brummelchen wrote:for those who care - "Tab Session Manager" seems a very decent replacement for Session Manager. It can save automatically, save on finish and manually. currently it lacks export/import. even "Tab Saver" has its own format.
I am currently using Tab Session Manager, but for some reason it doesn't restore page positions when loading a session. Session Manager did that really well.
I hope Session Manager is going to be updated for Firefox 57+.
designbuyers
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Re: [Ext]Session Manager 0.8.1.13 - January 30, 2017

Post by designbuyers »

we looking for update for newer version of Firefox..
László
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Joined: November 19th, 2015, 1:48 am

Re: [Ext]Session Manager 0.8.1.13 - January 30, 2017

Post by László »

Will there be a webextension version? Is there hope?
grizzler
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Joined: May 6th, 2012, 11:57 pm

Re: [Ext]Session Manager 0.8.1.13 - January 30, 2017

Post by grizzler »

There are several postings above yours in this thread that would give you an indication whether that is possible/likely.
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